How was Trump's victory over Harris declared so quickly? - Poynter

At last, Donald Trump quickly made his return to the White House clear. It didn’t take too long before this news spread across media platforms and social networks alike. Joe Biden was declared victor by media outlets including The Associated Press shortly before noon Saturday, Nov 7 2020; four days after Election Day had concluded due to complications posed by COVID-19 pandemic and unusually large number of mail ballots received for counting purposes. This year’s call came around 5:39 a.m. Nov. 6, approximately 12 hours after polls closed — three hours later than 2016, six hours behind 2008 and 2012 calls made prior to midnight on election night. Trump won by an overwhelming margin and, thanks to that margin, was declared victor. That race wasn’t decided until Dec 13, after an extended recount in Florida and intervention from the Supreme Court; Trump’s margin helped hasten that call. As of November 6 afternoon, this year’s margin of victory had grown from 117,000 votes in Georgia and 191,000 votes in North Carolina to 133,000 votes in Pennsylvania, 29,000 votes in Wisconsin and 81,324 votes cast for Governor in Michigan. “The key is not being too close,” Ned Foley, an Ohio State University law professor specializing in elections said. The closer an election gets, the harder it becomes to call and thus longer it takes before media call is issued – not an official result! Media calls typically involve modeling how ballots were counted versus uncounted to ensure there’s no chance for unexpected shifts to occur after making an election call. One factor contributing to an earlier call this year than in 2020 could be “that this election had more of an even playing field”, said Charles Stewart III of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Election Data and Science Lab. Stewart noted that Trump performed 2.5-3 points better in 2024 compared to 2020 in almost every state and local election he participated in, “which meant two things. First, all battleground states within or close to this margin easily switched sides. Second, many conservative states that had become competitive could easily flip to Trump.” Second, networks and data providers probably felt emboldened to declare states for Trump early by knowing it would likely be a uniform swing election, rather than having more variations between 2020 and 2016. At 11:19 p.m. on Election Day, North Carolina became officially designated by Associated Press as a battleground state. As soon as midnight Nov. 6 arrived, Georgia and Pennsylvania both declared victories at 1:02 a.m.; Pennsylvania at 2:25; Wisconsin 5:35 and Michigan 12:55 pm were also called before Arizona and Nevada had not yet been called by 3:30 pm Nov 6. Amy Walter, publisher and editor-in-chief of Cook Political Report with Amy Walter, noticed something off about Harris long before these calls were placed when some early returns from New Hampshire and Virginia came in. One early result from Virginia was particularly discouraging for Walter and Kyle Kondik, managing editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at UVa Center for Politics. Kondik cited how Harris’ poor showing in Loudoun County, Virginia — which traditionally leans Democratic — as one of several early warning signals during Election Night. “[This was the equivalent of] Miami-Dade County, Florida voting against Joe Biden so decisively in 2020 that it sent signals that his victory might not be as comprehensive than initially projected going into an election.” Harris won Loudoun County this time by 16 points compared to Biden who won by 25. Shortly before 10 p.m. it became evident that Trump was maintaining his support from wealthy suburban areas like Waukesha County in Wisconsin and that Harris was trailing Biden’s 2020 performance in major Democratic vote engines such as Dane County in Wisconsin and Washtenaw County, Michigan. Stewart noted election officials had improved on some administrative challenges from 2020. There had been minor glitches but nothing extraordinary, Stewart observed. Worrisome was “many more reports of bomb scares than I have in previous years” according to this fact check from PolitiFact (part of Poynter Institute), though he couldn’t determine whether there had been actual threats made or simply more widespread reporting. You can view sources here.